Posts Tagged ‘Lukas’

For the moment, I’ve taken off the link to this blog from my twitter, and I’m going to be deleting the twitterfeeds as well. I don’t anticipate doing this for long and they’ll be back up in a few days or so, for a couple of reasons which I will explain, but firstly I’ll explain why I’ve done it. I’ve started seeing a wonderful guy called T, and he’s so nice. He cooked me dinner last night, we talk on msn all the time, and we have great coffee sessions. I’ve also stayed over at his place a couple of times and everything seems good so far. I appreciate that all the time that I’ve been whining about being single and various foibles with guys, unrequited attractions etc., I’ve wanted someone solid, stable, interesting and nice, and now I appear to be finding that. So why am I so fucking scared?

I know that part of it is that I don’t want to end up hurting T the way that I hurt Lukas in the past. Although Lukas was way too clingy, and turned out to be a bit of a nutcase, he didn’t deserve to be hurt the way he was – even though it was an honest accident, being dumped by text is not the way that I operate (I think it’s a pretty shitty thing to do) and I will always regret that that was how things went down. T, although we’ve only known each other for a few weeks, appears to be better in every way. So the thought of accidentally hurting T and really upsetting him (I’m confident he likes me a lot) really scares me. I’ve always been the kind of person who feels nervous but manages to override his fear, but I won’t lie and I’ll say that being single is so much easier – you’re not responsible for anyone else’s feelings and you don’t have to worry about what makes them happy or what makes them sad. If I, in some way, hurt T through no fault of his own, I think it would make me feel really awful. So that’s part of my fear.

Thus getting to the reason why I’ve temporarily hidden the link to this blog. If you’ve read some of my entries over the past 4 months, you’ll know that I’ve developed pretty serious feelings for someone. Someone whom I can never have, but who has redefined what it is to be a man, and has shown me what I want to aim for as a man myself. He’s one of my best friends, he’s really important to me, and I’m a total masochist for allowing my feelings to grow to this point. But I know (whether I like it or not) that I can never have him as anything more than a best friend (!!!) and that is enough to treasure. I don’t die inside very often, and when I am dying, I just grin and bear it until I come out the other side. I’m very lucky to have such a friend who’s been more of a role model for me than my father ever was, than any male figure has ever been. If you’ve been reading, you know all of this and more, and I don’t need to recap. But because I’ve been so honest and open about this on here, I don’t want to risk any of T’s feelings being hurt if he reads it – surely he couldn’t help but wonder? Nothing inappropriate’s ever happened, but the fact that the desire is there, and it’s stronger than I care to admit most of the time, makes me feel like it would be something that could hurt his feelings, or at least question my sincerity towards him. And I do like him. Things have gone quite fast, and I think I want to slow down a little bit and just enjoy the moment and be easy with having someone there for me – because I’m scared of rushing myself, I’m scared of rushing our emotions and burning out too quickly, I’m scared of accidentally hurting him but I also want to give myself time to get a grip on my heart. That makes sense, right? I don’t want to mess anything up so early on, but I also don’t want to push things too fast without really knowing what we’re getting into. I deserve a good, stable relationship with a good, stable man, and I’m not going to run away from T – that would be totally counter-productive and I’d be back at square one. But I’m going to take my time – I have to do this for the sanity of my head and the security of my heart.

I guess that’s the crux of the matter. I don’t really know how to just be in a relationship with someone. I definitely overthink things (as Mike has said and as I’m well aware), and I can’t stop my mind and heart running away with me. How do you do that? How do you turn your brain off, dial your emotions down? The longest relationship I’ve had has barely touched two months, and even then I felt somewhat claustrophobic, like I somehow couldn’t let a person get too close to me for fear of getting hurt, for fear of too much responsibility over their emotions and heart, and for fear of showing them all of me only for them to be disgusted, find a host of imperfections, or plain run away. I don’t know why I feel this as it’s totally irrational, and all my close friends know me for who I am and seem to be perfectly happy with it. There’s nothing wrong with me. And yet I’m not confident in believing myself when I say that there’s nothing wrong with me.

And if there’s nothing wrong with me, why am I hiding this blog from him? Over the last 6 months (has it been that long?!??!) of writing, I’ve really enjoyed it, I’ve made a handful of new friends whom I’ve really appreciated, and I have relished the ability to be so honest and frank. Unwittingly, by adding T to my twitter (but how could I refuse? And why should I refuse?) I’ve compromised my ability to be candid, to be frank with him, and with all of you. Shouldn’t he be able to like me for who I am? My heart is who I am, writing this blog has become a part of who I am, and as well as the main concern of not being able to be totally honest with him, it’s gonna affect my hits 😛 (although ironically, since I took this off twitter on Monday, my views have gone up?!?!? where’s the logic?) But I’m not going to delete my posts about Mike, I’m not willing to censor myself and write differently, so I’m not going to change the way I express myself on this blog because I know that some readers appreciate my candour and can relate. Plus it’s cathartic for me. But I really, really don’t want to raise questions in T’s mind about my affection for Mike nor about my sincerity towards him. I want to see where this relationship leads, I deserve a nice boyfriend (and so does he!) and I want to enjoy spending time with him (albeit relaxing a little bit now after our quite intense, fast beginnings). I just hope that eventually, he will understand that Mike will always be in my heart, but nothing can ever happen and if things go right in the future, I could hold him in my heart too. And that’s the best way I can express myself and it still doesn’t quite express my feelings how I want to – but hopefully you understand what I mean, because it’s the best I can do. Thankyou for reading, and I hope you understand.

I understand that this blog has been a bit Rihanna-focused lately, but between the new material that has been premiering online and the publicity surrounding her 20/20 interview (which is a must-see – check it out at Toya’s World), I’ve been hooked on her once again.

Within this interview (which resonated with me more than I will go into on this particular post), Rihanna said two things that I thought were particularly interesting. One thing was the notion of feeling ashamed and embarrassed when the picture of her battered face was leaked by the media – because she fell in love with a person who could do that to her. Obviously you can’t help who you fall in love with, you never know how abusive they might be until the first time it happens, and the notion of shame is one that we could debate for days anyway. But the idea of that was interesting to me, that there are certain of us who seem to feel humiliated or ashamed by things that are essentially not our fault – yet we take the blame for ourselves. It reminded me of a time when I was dating L, and we found out that we had a friend in common, M. So everything was cool, and it was a nice coincidence and all that business. And I remember having a conversation with L, and he said that M had told him effectively to be gentle / careful with me as I’d been hurt in the past. I remember just feeling utterly mortified, humiliated and ashamed. I wasn’t angry (and I’m not angry about it now) – after all, M wasn’t wrong, and I wasn’t embarrassed by the fact that he had told L to treat me nicely; although it wasn’t necessary for him to do that, I appreciated the sentiment and understand that M was only looking out for me.

But I felt ashamed that someone viewed me as fragile, vulnerable or emotionally unstable. That someone might have to explain my apparent insecurities to someone else made me feel humiliated. I mean, yes, I have been hurt in the past (and then during that relationship – although I caused L hurt too, something which I still feel sad about, as I never meant to – and since) and my reluctance to let somebody in right away stems from that. I was discussing with Emma last night that I am a very suspicious person, and if someone is friends with me or enters into a relationship with me, or even just approaches me in a bar or whatever flirtatious setting, I can’t help but wonder why they’re doing it, what they want from me, and whether they just want to use me up and throw me away. I guess that comes from past experiences, and also probably what I’ve learned from my mother. But I can’t help suspecting people, and I admit that I’m still growing as a person and I’m more insecure than I might care to admit to anyone who isn’t very close to me. So for somebody to not only penetrate the façade I uphold of being strong (and at the same time as being a vulnerable person, I also believe that I am a strong person and that the two can co-exist within me), of being independent and of being teflon, but also to have to make excuses for the way I am and the fact that I might not let somebody in as quickly as 1-2-3 made me feel embarrassed.

Why should I feel embarrassed about myself? In relationships, I don’t know what is up with me but I generally manage to get into these tortuous situations without ever having something concrete that lasts very long. But I am a popular person, an intelligent person and a handsome person – my friends say that I will not be single for long, etc. etc. These are things people say – who knows whether it will come true or not? There’s more to life, but I can’t help but wonder if the façade I try to maintain at all times slips more often than I realise? I think I would feel equally humiliated to know that the vulnerability and sadness I try to hide every day of my life was in actuality on full show half the time, and that that might be part of what turns people off wanting to date me or feeling attracted to me. I hate the thought of people feeling sorry for me – not only because they shouldn’t, since everyone has their own pain and who’s to say that mine is greater than anyone else’s, but because I’d rather people didn’t focus their pity on me. I understand it’s out of kindness or what have you, but I don’t desire that kind of attention.

The second sentiment Rihanna expressed was that of “F love”. If you’re in an abusive relationship, be it physically, verbally or emotionally, you have to keep your judgment unclouded by love, and you need to do what is logically right for you, your safety and your health, regardless of the direction in which your heart pulls you. That is a hell of a lot easier said than done; exhibit a) my current infatuation with somebody with a ring on it. And this isn’t the first time that love has led me astray – this time, although the feelings are intense, at least I am getting something out of the relationship and it makes me happy more than it makes me sad. Looking at my parents’ marriage, both past and very current present, although I’m proud of the storms they have weathered, if I had been in my mother’s position, I would never have put up with it. And if I had been in my father’s position, I would never have put up with it. Without saying too much, I don’t know if love was their only motivation in deciding to stay together (I highly doubt it, since things are rarely that clear-cut), but I would certainly have said “Fuck love, fuck everything, I’m gone.” Even though I am a vulnerable person, and quite often I believe that part of me must be really an ugly person, I still have more self-worth than to go along with it.

Last night, I was out with Emma and we had some really special heart-to-heart conversations. Obviously I am going to divulge nothing of what we discussed (here or anywhere else), because I made her a promise to keep what she told me to myself, and that is the whole point – I am a trustworthy person and trust is such a fragile thing, such a precious thing and something that takes so long to build. Be it because of past experiences, be it because of what I’ve learned from my parents and other relationships that have surrounded me as I’ve grown up, but I find it hard to trust people and it’s rare that I am totally and immediately open with my heart to friends I’ve known for years, let alone somebody new in my life. But I believe that trust is vital for life, for relationships, for friendships. The thought of my betraying someone else makes me feel sick; a promise is a sacred thing, and there is so little that is sacred in life. I think that having some self-worth as a person, even if it ebbs and flows sometimes, is really important, and the fact that I feel I am trustworthy, that I have dignity, and that I have the ability to give love but also am now aware that sometimes we have to say “F love” makes me a good friend and will one day mean that I might be a good boyfriend and not feel so ugly at my lowest… These things give me hope, they give me something to aspire to, and I hope to at the end of my life be able to look back and say that I was a good person, I was a strong person and that I did myself proud. Work in progress.

So one of my close friends at uni started asking about my love life, and I answered honestly but somewhat evasively (as the “gay” thing hasn’t come up yet, and it looks like it’s going to be up to me to break the ice) that I’m not really focusing on that, I’m just concentrating on doing a good job of the course (which is going so so well so far!) and getting myself stable and sorted. I mean, after my events this year where I realised I wasn’t into L when he was so into me, and then I fell for D too quickly only for his ex to snap him back up, and then R thought… well I don’t know what he was thinking, but I am not going to be anybody’s bit on the side; after all of that and more, I definitely am not eager to just run into somebody’s arms.

Nevertheless, I think that a lot of us can relate to the feeling when you’re on your own late at night, and you just wish that you could rest in somebody’s embrace and have them hold you until the morning. At uni with all of the straight older guys on my course, it’s really quite maddening because I know that girls have had crushes on me and find me attractive, and I can appreciate that all the guys on my course are older but they are really solid and normal and genuine-seeming and nice – their partners are really lucky! Gay guys, by and large, are the total opposite of this – trying too hard to be something they are not, or abiding by the laws of a stereotype or rebelling too hard against it. I guess maybe it’s a maturity thing (I’m the youngest by a fair bit – the average age of the students on my course is 30 or thereabouts), and I’m certainly a work in progress too, but I just want a guy who feels comfortable in his skin and can give me his all and accept my all in return without either playing games or clinging too much to me.

I was on msn the other night and suddenly B comes online. By this point, it’s been a month since we even spoke, and I just presumed that he had gotten bored of me or wanted his own space or had better things to do. After all, I have better things to do than just wait around for him to be in the right mood, so I guess our drifting apart was natural; I had moved on. So he tells me that he has been meaning to contact me for a while and had felt bad for leaving it so long (what, was his phone broke? He had been online at the same time as me on other occasions in the interim, and I had noticed his online profile on the dating site I’ve been frequenting a lot less recently), and that he is currently seeking a diagnosis for adult ADHD. He asked me to google it, so I looked it up, and I don’t for a second think he is lying – he’s been fairly upfront from the jump about his emotional and psychological instabilities. His current difficulties with a new job at his local salon (he was previously a mobile hairdresser so it’s a promising progression for him) and what I know of his previous problems all tally up – it makes sense to me, and I try to be as supportive as I can without crowding him or suggesting that he can rely on me – after all, although at one point it looked as if things were gonna get popping and that I was developing strong feelings for him, it fizzled out because he kept disappearing on me. I mean, with a condition such as depression or ADHD, it is understandable and I can accept his excuses and reasons… but the question remains, What am I supposed to do about it? What does he want from me? Does he want just a friend? Does he want something more than that? Does he think that I am just going to wait around patiently while he sorts himself out and decides?

I don’t know what to do about it, but I guess the best thing is to do nothing. I have uni to concentrate on, I have driving lessons to buy, I have my part-time job and my weight to keep down (still don’t know where the gym is going to fit into my current schedule :S) and my friends and family and my music. I don’t need to worry about whether B is ok, when he’s going to talk to me next, and what he’s going to tell me. I sincerely wish him the best, and maybe in the future something could work if our circumstances mesh and he comes correct. Until then, I’ll chill with my new friends at uni, and wish that I could meet someone who was real and mature and funny and cool like them, but who would also like me back without being the wrong gender!

Tonight I met up with Adam to wish him well as he moves back home to Devon, and we went to Cabot Circus for some drinks at Giraffe and a meal at Gourmet Burger Kitchen. Walking into Cabot Circus, I bumped into my friend Annie who works at Harvey Nichols; we exchanged pleasantries and enquired about each others jobs – the usual. As I said goodbye to her, I walked along towards the Cabot entrance by Zara, and I saw what suspiciously looked like a group of my old colleagues from the Perfume Shop. After the untruths that they have been telling both themselves and other people, I really have nothing to say to them so I turned around and walked into Cabot the other way. Walking back past Annie, I said to her “actually, this way is quicker!” She laughed, my excuse was made so that I didn’t look totally bizarre, and I met Adam, positioned overlooking the escalators so I could hide should the Perfume Shop crew be approaching my direction.

This is the second time recently that I have had this sort of reaction: to want to actively avoid certain people. It happened when I was in Zara with Hannah and my ex L was at the till, and it happened tonight. In both cases, I turned around and walked the other way. Was this the right response? After all, I have nothing to be ashamed of: I never meant to hurt L the way that I did, and it was his choice not to accept or to believe my apology and explanation for what happened. I never stole anything from the Perfume Shop, and I never gave discount to anyone I didn’t know, no matter what they say. I don’t feel any guilt, and there is no reason for me to be ashamed. So why did I walk away?

It was the fight or flight response. In each case, I made a very swift judgement call, and in both cases my brain told me to get out of there. Part of me resents that; like I said, I don’t have anything to feel ashamed for, so why should I leave? Why should I run away? Isn’t it the stronger thing, the better thing to stand there and fight and show that I’m not going to be cowed or intimidated by anyone? That I believe in my own convictions?

But nevertheless, I chose to avoid the confrontation. Perhaps it is just easier to get out of there; to avoid things being said that might worsen the situation, to get into an uncomfortable exchange that might only leave an unpleasant aftertaste more bitter than that which lingers already. Although part of me feels that I should stand my ground, another part feels that the more mature thing is just to rise above it and conduct my life along a different path. I have plenty of my own shit to focus on without dealing with other people’s shit. I don’t need to deliberately put myself in the vicinity of their insecurities and problems, because even if I have no reason to run away, it doesn’t mean I should purposely seek out such a confrontation. I had a lovely evening tonight, and had I approached my old colleagues, that could very well have been ruined before it had even started. So even if I should have been unashamed to stand my ground, I stand by my decision to choose a more positive alternative and bypass the negativity altogether. Avoiding a toxic situation is preferable to fighting poison, because even in fighting it you risk becoming poisoned yourself. Sometimes we have to choose our fights, and whether it’s best to fight on, or to fly high; this time, I chose to fly high.

I was sitting in the back of the car on the way back from Tetbury today, where my parents and I went for lunch. I was in a pretty foul mood, for several reasons: since upgrading my Macbook to Snow Leopard yesterday, I’d had numerous application faults, and the latest was that I was unable to use my printer, which meant that I was unable to make a start on the preparatory task I’d been given for uni. (I’ve since fixed the printer, and after numerous re-installs and restarts, Snow Leopard seems to be working fine now, and has also made my iPod go back to working at normal speed! 🙂 ) I was then feeling apprehensive at the prospect of having lunch with my parents, because it’s always the same: we go to a pub out in the country, have some standard food and drink, either make stiff conversation or blend into the background while my parents talk to each other, and then turn around and come home again. I just can’t be bothered to make the effort for something so boring, and playing ‘happy families’ feels so fake. I then had to get changed to go on this lunch, and I realised that half of my wardrobe is effectively shit, which meant that I ended up throwing a pile of clothes across the room in search of something to wear. When I found a garment that was suitable, I had to pick these clothes up and put them back on my chair. I dumped too much hair gel on my head in the midst of this rage, and then had to make it work. (I did.) Then I got downstairs after my mother kept hollering at me to “hurry up”, and proceeded to wait for my parents!!! If they were telling me to hurry up, why did I end up waiting for them?

So I was in a mega-sulk. I was listening to Courtney Love / Hole on my iPod and saying nothing, reading American Psycho. After walking around Tetbury (since it is so tiny, it did not take long), we ended up going for lunch in a place called The Crown. For the first half an hour, I was quite unimpressed by The Crown. The decor was a bit run down, but that wasn’t really an issue. However, my mother ordered a tonic water, and received half a glass, which I brought to her and then brought back to the bar to check that it was meant to be that small an amount of water. (It was.) Then two dogs (why were dogs in the pub?!?! They weren’t guide dogs) proceeded to have a loud fight in the corner, and my father brought over the food menu, which consisted of 6 items, including “lazange” and “cod & chips in sause”. After clearing up the residue from the bottoms of our glasses, because we were not provided coasters (nor did they seem to exist anywhere in this establishment), I settled on the “lazange” because my parents were getting irritated at my mood and the fact that I could not decide what to eat (they said that we might have to go elsewhere, and I did not want to deal with the combination of their annoyance at my indecisiveness, and prolonging our stay in Tetbury any more than was necessary). It turned out that the lasagne was lovely, and so was the garlic bread that came with it. The food was that place’s saving grace; still, I don’t think I will be going back there again.

Eventually, my parents engaged me in conversation and things started to improve as my mood slowly lifted. We talked about my mother’s friend who looks like she is going to die of cancer quite soon, then about certain friends and relatives of mine who have pissed me off either by criticising my every decision (I am not a moron: I know the risks and possible consequences of smoking / using a sunbed / drinking a coffee at Starbucks / spending a lot of money / not getting as much sleep as would be ideal. I’m an adult and I can make decisions for myself and weigh up the pros and cons. If I decide to do something, I don’t need you on my back asking me if I’m sure I want to be doing that, because this is my life and I don’t tell you how to live yours. Yes, you are criticising me and my ability to choose what I want to do, and I have had enough of it thanks, so please don’t ‘impart your wisdom’ in the future, because I don’t want it and I don’t need it.) or by suddenly getting indignant that I don’t want to see whatever crappy film they choose, because I am tired of wasting my money on films I have no interest in, and going to the cinema is not a particularly sociable activity anyway, so why is it suddenly such a problem if I don’t want to see your film and am happy just to go to a café and converse? And when somebody else is busy, I politely accept it, but now that I have other commitments, it inconveniences them and I’m supposed to feel guilty? No way.

So I let off a bit of steam, my parents assured me that I was utterly in the right and had nothing to feel guilty about, and that to just let the people who were on my back have some space and it would all be fine. A sensible plan I shall try to adhere to! We left Tetbury, and I started thinking about other people who have gotten on my nerves. My thoughts turned to my ex, and my mind went over how I had sent a text message revealing my intent to break up with him to him instead of to my friend Hannah. He chose to believe I had done it on purpose, that I had orchestrated the whole thing on purpose for an easy escape and to humiliate him in the process. That was totally not the case, and I tried to explain it and was sorry to have sent him that message; it was an honest accident, and Hannah was meant to receive the message (it even said her name at the beginning!). But his friends, who had never met me, told him I must have done it on purpose, so he chose to believe them rather than me. That’s fine, that’s his loss. I don’t apologise twice, I didn’t want to be with him anyway, so I let him believe what he wanted – I was emancipated at the end of the day. I regret causing somebody hurt like that, but I don’t feel guilty because it was an honest mistake that I had apologised for; to have that apology thrown back in my face by not only him, but other people who don’t know me at all made the whole thing easier for me to just move on.

But thinking about it, I thought that I couldn’t believe that I let him touch me, put his hands on me, kiss me. It makes my skin crawl, not only because he was so clingy, but sometimes the thought of physical contact makes me shudder. I’m generally quite at ease with physical contact – I’m quite close to my parents and my friends, hugging them and such. Obviously, I’m not a virgin so when I’m in the mood to be intimate with someone, it feels right and I’m not forced into it. But when I put my mind to it, I don’t like people seeing my naked body (and never have); returning to the idea of façades, I try to give off the idea that I am confident in the way I look and at ease with my body, because it makes me appear more confident and flawless. But in reality, I don’t like feeling exposed and I don’t like being touched or kissed or anything like that. I have major trust issues, I know that. Every single person I have dated has let me down in one way or another, and quite a few of them have just wanted sex from me and then got bored, either because they weren’t going to get it, or because they got it and then they didn’t have to pretend to be interested in me as a person anymore. At times, it makes me sick that I’ve let these people touch me, put their hands on me and use me to further their own pleasure. Sometimes I wish that I were untouchable; sometimes I wish that I could just disconnect my heart and mind from my body and float off somewhere while people are doing what they want to do with me, to me, for me. Sometimes I wish that I could be with somebody who really liked me for who I am. Because I am tired of protecting my heart, only to let somebody in and then it all goes wrong and I am hurt and used anyway. I guess that whether it’s physical or emotional, it’s the thought that I have been used that makes me really sick, hurt and regretful.

First things first: if you happened to read my previous post, you might think that I am a teensy bit crazy. I want to promise you that while I can be less rational at some times than at others, the only reason why I sounded so unhinged was because my father was driving me insane. He finally went to bed at 12:30, after I drank some of his cider behind his back to hurry up the process. He slumped away from his laptop, defeated and worn down. I think I made my point. 😉 But please excuse my temper (not physically violent Naomi-temper, but hot-blooded Italian super-stubborn arm-waving raised voice temper), I’ll try to keep it in check for y’all 🙂

I can’t get this new song by LeToya Luckett out of my head:

It’s called “Don’t Need You”, and it’s going to be on her new album Lady Love, which I am highly anticipating. I relate to the song because as much as I should appreciate the freedom of single life and the fun of being able to appreciate who’s hot and who’s not, and being able to flirt when I want (something which I continued to do during my brief period dating L, which was an indication that it just wasn’t right), I still feel like I want to be with somebody, and I still feel lonely. So this song reminds me that really, we don’t need anyone but ourselves, because 90% of the time people, especially boyfriends or potential boyfriends, only let you down in the end (or quite often, at the beginning). But the reason why I have been listening to it is because of the very first lyric:

It’s Monday morning, checked my cell phone / but nobody’s calling me.
I try to ignore it but it’s sinking in / that I’m all alone with me.

If you’ve been reading my blogs lately, you’ll have picked up on how important being able to communicate is with me. I don’t expect a constant barrage of attention (that’s actually a big no-no, because you should have better things to do with your day 😉 ) but I do expect a little bit of consideration, and I expect any correspondence I make to be returned within a decent period of time (I think 24 hours is lenient and appropriate). So I keep kicking myself when I find myself constantly checking my phone wondering why I seem to send people texts which don’t get returned, asking questions that get ignored and realising that the effort that I put into laying foundations for dates and maintaining friendships isn’t always reciprocated. Why bother? Why keep trying? Does that make me the fool? I’m not exactly glued to my phone, but it is a mobile phone, the concept behind which is that I keep it on me so that I can contact and be contacted when I am not at home. The mobile phone does not serve its purpose when its battery is depleted, when you cannot hear it or feel it, or when you leave it in your bag on silent for 3 days. You might as well chuck it out of the car window and then reverse over it a few times. What’s the point of having a cell phone if you’re not going to use it, and what’s the point of swapping numbers with me if you don’t want to talk? That’s why the above lyrics speak to me – because obviously I’m the dumb one (and my friends are of the same philosophy, so we are all dumb together) expecting these things and checking my phone regardless.

Looking at my tag cloud, it strikes me that the 3 biggest things (at the moment) are “appreciating life”, “music” and “relationships”. I guess I am glad that I am not a one-dimensional person, and I am able to write about lots of different facets of my life, because I suppose it means that I am not totally boring. Today I went and had coffee with Hannah, saw a totally beautiful but too expensive Armani bag that I will not even consider buying before I have a paycheck again (or at least until my credit card ticks over to September 😉 ), got an interview for a call centre which I am going to do even though the hospital thing seems more or less certain (I take nothing for granted in the current job market!) and had some good news regarding university funding which I might well receive after all because I have XY chromosomes. But I was wondering, a couple of my friends say that my blog goes deeper than “today I did this and that” and say that I should be the male Carrie Bradshaw. Apart from being a huge compliment, one reason why I don’t know if I am ready for that is because I don’t know if I could choose one niche to write about. I suppose relationships is the most meaty topic, and there are plenty of music blogs that are much more devoted to the daily developments than I would be. I wonder how you get to be a columnist? In any case, I have noticed that (the Whitney Houston post aside!) I tend to get more views on writing about topics that are personal to me and yet relatable to everyone, like relationships and frustrations and life’s mysteries and conundrums. I find that touching, and while I hope for my life to go smooth and to live happily ever after with a rich Brazilian model and a lucrative music and fashion career, that might never happen and it’s still a work in progress. 😉 So I hope to write more about my relationships and life’s trials and tribulations, and maybe someone will notice and want me to write a column for them. Anything is possible! And I am happy to do it, as long as you’re all right here with me. 🙂

I decided to name this post after my favourite track from Britney Spears’ album Blackout because it kinda sums up how I’ve been feeling. I think at times we all get the temptation to feel sorry for ourselves, but in a way this self-pity is something we can rationalise and yet something we know we shouldn’t do (or don’t need to feel). There’s a tension between appreciating the good things in your life, and then seeing how you could still improve your life and all the faults that exist within it. I will explain with illustrations from my very own personal life. 😉

With the last person I officially dated, L, I knew all along that I wasn’t really into the relationship. And it was all too clear just how into me he was. On the surface, he was kind, attentive, considerate and charming, if a little bit childlike (despite being 3 years my senior). But I knew, deep down, that I didn’t feel for him how he obviously felt for me, and my failing was not putting a stop to it and nipping it in the bud. Instead, I kept going hoping that my feelings would grow to match his, and perhaps accepting my caution at first as a defence mechanism after previous bad experiences. But finally, it became clear to me that I had to break up with him, though I ended up doing it by accident… I sent him a text message I meant to send to my friend, saying that I couldn’t take the situation anymore and that I had to break up with L, as it was making me ill. So L received this and went insane, and we had a breakup-via-text that I never meant to initiate. I apologised and explained that it was all a mistake, and sending a text message to the wrong person happens all the time. It’s an easy mistake to make, and all my friends have done it just as I now have. And yet, be it out of hurt or out of anger, my apology was rejected because L and “his friends” (whom I never met and who never met me) decided that I had decided to send the text on purpose. I had nothing more to say, because I had attempted to apologise, and I wasn’t going to pursue L when I’d wanted us to be apart anyway. I will always regret the way that it happened, but I suppose I got what I wanted. And yet, despite it being an accident, for weeks afterwards I felt like a bad person, like the guilty one because I had caused pain to someone else. Perhaps because I knew I should have broken things off before that point. I was angry because my friends, whom L had met, had been nothing but nice to him, whereas I’d never met his friends and yet they were perfectly ready to pass judgment on me and analyse non-existent reasons for my text message, rather than take my apology at face value. So I was irritated, and I was relieved, but mostly I felt guilty for hurting someone. And yet, it was an escape from a face-to-face scenario (which I was planning that week, but considering L’s reaction over text messages, perhaps breaking up in person would have meant that he’d caused a scene in the café – lucky escape?) and I never had to see him or hear from him again. Is that really what I wanted? I guess so. So why should I be sad?

For anyone who read my detective blog yesterday, J did come back on msn. Although he didn’t really change his monosyllabic style of talking, he did seem a little bit more open. He maintained that his msn was crashing (I don’t believe this for a second) but that he wasn’t annoyed or embarrassed or anything, so fine. And this is the funny thing: even though he was the one perpetrating a sort of deception, I once again felt guilty (I obviously inherited the Catholic guilt from my mother’s family, despite not being Catholic myself) because I’d unceremoniously uncovered his secret – however shabbily-kept – and confronted him with it. I felt like I’d embarrassed him, because there is nothing wrong with being direct and asking for sex online if you so wish; there are plenty who are only too happy to oblige. So I tried to keep things light and smooth things over. Why did I feel the need to do this? I wasn’t the one who had tried to hide my identity, who had effectively advertised for people to come into my house and rape me, who had pretended that I didn’t want people to see my body. All I’d done was uncover that J had done these things, and yet in a way I felt like I had robbed him of a tiny piece of dignity. Perhaps that was a part of his façade, and I guess I felt like I’d ripped it away. But why so guilty? If it had been me, the person wouldn’t have given it a second thought… So why should I feel sad?

I decided to return B’s text, and he replied after a while wishing me luck, and saying he had work all week also. I thought I might as well bite the bullet, since I’ve all but lost interest, and asked him whether he had received my invite to the cinema and how come he was never on msn anymore (we used to have really long, intimate conversations on there at first). Again, no reply as of yet, and I don’t even expect one. I don’t think that B is a malicious person, and I like him, but I’m not under any delusions – he’s a little bit crazy. He doesn’t think anything of only replying to people when he chooses, and one minute he can’t leave me alone, the next he disappears off the face of the earth. It makes no sense; and yet I anticipated that something like this would happen. I’m not surprised, because my paranoia once again was proved right. I’m not going to waste my time pursuing somebody who can’t communicate, and I’m not going to expect a high level of friendship from someone until they show they can be more consistent and reliable. And yet, I feel guilty once again: what did I do to drive him away? Am I ugly to him? Am I boring? Does he just not want to go on a date? My heart hurts and the guilt fades all too slowly, despite the fact that I know in my head that I should aim higher and not get strung out on people who already irritate me with their fluctuating attention spans. So why should I be sad?

I know that in this blog I’ve focused a fair amount of the fact that I’m not where I thought I would be at this point in my life, having graduated from Oxford University with a good degree. As a child and a teenager, I always seemed to do the right things, and despite never being the richest or the most popular at school, I was someone who seemed to have everything going for me. And I can’t complain; I’ve lived in Spain, I’ve studied at a prestigious university, I’ve paid off my overdraft and credit cards, I’ve been a retail manager, I have a close family and close friends, I write, sing and produce my own music, I’m starting a new university course in September which will hopefully give me the extra kick I need to get a job at Connexions that I will enjoy. It’s hard to believe in myself when life takes me on a different course to what I intended, but despite this year being a bit less exciting than what I’d intended, I suppose I shouldn’t waste my time feeling down. Half of me feels like I’m stuck in a rut, but I know it won’t last for long. I try to keep in mind all of the achievements I’ve made and the positive things, and compared to others, I guess I’m pretty lucky (though I won’t complain to be luckier!). So why should I be sad?